The personal information of millions of Taiwanese smartphone users who have installed Chinese applications could be sent to Beijing, a lawmaker warned yesterday, demanding that the government to ban public servants from using Chinese-designed apps.
Chinese smartphone and Web applications WeChat, QQ, Weibo, Taobao and Alipay — social media and e-commerce platforms that are popular in Taiwan — are required by Chinese laws to send personal information and user-generated content back to servers in China for security checks and for content to be filtered, DPP Legislator Chen Chi-mai (陳其邁) told a press conference.
Chinese telecommunication laws require Internet service providers to store and report content which “jeopardizes national security and unification,” among others things, to the authority.
“More than 6 million Taiwanese users of mobile text and voice messaging communication service WeChat, developed by China’s Tencent and registered in Taiwan as a Hong Kong company with Chinese investment, have been monitored by Beijing,” Chen said.
While US Internet service provider Yahoo succumbed to Beijing’s pressure and provided the personal information of four Chinese dissidents to Beijing in 2006, he said, Wikipedia and online search engine service provider Google both refuse to be monitored by China.
Additionally, Chinese companies’ practices have violated the Personal Information Protection Act (個人資料保護法), he said.
“The government should make a decision on whether it’s keen on protecting Taiwanese people’s privacy,” he added.
Chen said the government should prohibit public servants from using Chinese-designed software and demand that service providers notify users about how their personal information is to be handled.
Taiwan is stepping up plans to create self-sufficient supply chains for combat drones and increase foreign orders from the US to counter China’s numerical superiority, a defense official said on Saturday. Commenting on condition of anonymity, the official said the nation’s armed forces are in agreement with US Admiral Samuel Paparo’s assessment that Taiwan’s military must be prepared to turn the nation’s waters into a “hellscape” for the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA). Paparo, the commander of the US Indo-Pacific Command, reiterated the concept during a Congressional hearing in Washington on Wednesday. He first coined the term in a security conference last
A magnitude 4.3 earthquake struck eastern Taiwan's Hualien County at 8:31am today, according to the Central Weather Administration (CWA). The epicenter of the temblor was located in Hualien County, about 70.3 kilometers south southwest of Hualien County Hall, at a depth of 23.2km, according to the administration. There were no immediate reports of damage resulting from the quake. The earthquake's intensity, which gauges the actual effect of a temblor, was highest in Taitung County, where it measured 3 on Taiwan's 7-tier intensity scale. The quake also measured an intensity of 2 in Hualien and Nantou counties, the CWA said.
The Overseas Community Affairs Council (OCAC) yesterday announced a fundraising campaign to support survivors of the magnitude 7.7 earthquake that struck Myanmar on March 28, with two prayer events scheduled in Taipei and Taichung later this week. “While initial rescue operations have concluded [in Myanmar], many survivors are now facing increasingly difficult living conditions,” OCAC Minister Hsu Chia-ching (徐佳青) told a news conference in Taipei. The fundraising campaign, which runs through May 31, is focused on supporting the reconstruction of damaged overseas compatriot schools, assisting students from Myanmar in Taiwan, and providing essential items, such as drinking water, food and medical supplies,
New Party Deputy Secretary-General You Chih-pin (游智彬) this morning went to the National Immigration Agency (NIA) to “turn himself in” after being notified that he had failed to provide proof of having renounced his Chinese household registration. He was one of more than 10,000 naturalized Taiwanese citizens from China who were informed by the NIA that their Taiwanese citizenship might be revoked if they fail to provide the proof in three months, people familiar with the matter said. You said he has proof that he had renounced his Chinese household registration and demanded the NIA provide proof that he still had Chinese
RSS